Manlio Rules

ok,

so,

one of the things i really wanted to do when i was in NY a few weeks ago was play music. i dont’ get much chance to play out here, for a few various reasons, most of them job related. so i booked some time at an old studio space in NY and rented a guitar, and brought mike, matt, and neil along to make some music. we played for 3 hours, and the results of it can be seen here:

http://www.mloco.com/files/june07jam/

sorry i don’t have one big zip file for all of these, i can put one up later tonight, but for now you’ll have to settle for listening and downloading one at a time…

some of these are pretty good, track 8 is the only one with lyrics, and we’re switching instruments around, though the basic lineup is:

Neil: Drums
Matt: Bass
Michael: Guitar, vocals on track 8
Me: Guitar

on 2 tracks i’m playing drums and neil is on keyboards, i think michael is on drums for one song and i’m playing bass on the last track that gets cut off, matt is on keys for that…

UPDATE: the zip file is on the server, here

Tonight was my last night in NYC for what will be awhile. It was a full retrospective. Started the evening in Astoria for dinner, followed by a little trip around the lower east side, and now back in brooklyn. It was a good night. i’m not drunk, but i’m a little buzzed and watching some TV, as well i should be. Thanks to everyone who made these last two weeks wonderful, i am going to miss every one of you so much.

A lot of people have asked me if i’m excited for the move to SF, and i really am. but i wouldn’t be as excited if i didn’t have as amazing and encouraging a group of friends as all of you. Y’all are the best.

ranking every new years eve that I had while i lived in NY.

1. 2004-2005: the theme of this new years was: i can do everything. Started the night at a friend of karen’s with the a/k combo, then Kevin’s place, which was big cause it was early days with those kids. then went to the crazy bunker 30’s party, and then rolled with scott into manhattan at 5AM. good times good times.
2. 2001-2002: Technically this doesn’t count, cause i was in seattle for it. but if it did count, this is where it would go. chillin with the seattle crew in those days was always a hedonistic blast.
3. 2005-2006: I was in a weird mood this whole night, but somehow it all worked out. I got to DJ for a few hours, and had my first “clear the floor” experience as a DJ, when i threw on “any way you want it” by journey.
4. 2000-2001: civilized early evening followed by debauchery till early hours. then eric threw up in my kitchen sink and i stayed up all night wondering where it all went wrong.
5. 2003-2004: blah. 3 parties, none of them much fun, i was a mess, and i owed like 4 people sincere apologies at the end of it all. Not a night for my highlight reel. on the plus side, my party hopping somehow created a legend of another ‘manlio’ in bburg who was having a party with fire eaters. and that’s pretty cool.
6. 2002-2003: a nice dinner with matt and neil followed by possibly the worst night of my life. if any night showed me the futility of trying to make important decisions while in another state of mind, this was it. it also showed me that being the only one in the room not hitting on the hot girl sometimes gets you her number. assuming everyone is trashed.

So, today in our series of things i’m going to miss/remember about New York, i’d like to discuss my favorite (and least favorite) bars from all my time in the city. let’s do 5 good ones and 3 bad ones. criteria to be determined as i continue to write:

Good bars:

1. Ace Bar: Easily the central bar of the ITP years for me, i had 3 birthdays here, and countless long drunken nights.
2. The Cellar: i admit this place got lame pretty fast once it became NYU undergrad central, but this was where Scott and I got the bulk of work done on our theater piece, every monday night from 10-1AM
3. DBA: i hate this place on the weekends, but back when Neil lived with me on allen st, nothing was better than the 2AM monday night whiskey here
4. McCann’s pub and grill: i think this was the place in astoria near my old apt, it was this little irish bar where kate and i would occasionally go if we had nothing to do in the city. excellent nachos
5. Barcade: really just a brilliant idea, and well executed. good beer and arkanoid.

also worthy of praise: Josie Woods, Bleecker St Bar, Floyd, Alibi, XR, Bar Coastal, that place near the bunker in bburg which had foosball, both softball bars that i can’t remember the names of, Bar None, the Riviera Cafe, Sing Sing, Union Pool, Decibel, uncle Ming’s, and the place across from uncle ming’s.

Bad bars:

1. Planet Rose: Objectively perhaps the worst bar/karaoke place in all of manhattan. dismal, weird people hanging out, and always just a little too crowded to be comfortable with more than a small group
2. Piano’s: i’m not sure why i hate piano’s as much as i do. but i really hate it.
3. Darkroom: fuck this place. there’s never a place to sit, it’s always too loud, and it’s routinely a post office (that’s my friend’s expression for a sausage fest)


I also hate these places: Orchard Bar, Lit, Eugene’s, that bar on 14th bet A and B that had only old irish men in it on a saturday night, all of the ludlow bars on weekends, snapper creek, John St. bar

so, since i’m leaving NY in less than three weeks (sob), i am going to try and write a few posts about my favorite and least favorite things about my 5.5 years in this city. some rules first:

1. nothing about people. or at least nothing centering on people… or centering on people in a negative light… yeah, basically i’m going to walk the line with this one.
2. ideally nothing too cheesy… like, i won’t be doing a “best friends” list, even if it wasn’t about people…
3. no confessions. well, maybe a few confessions.
4. keep the funny/introspective ratio closer to “funny”, or my definition of funny. and not weird funny, although i’m sure that can’t be avoided.

anyways.

a rating of my NY apartments, from best to worst. categories include location, overall fun had while living there, general roommate stuff, and all the other random stuff.

1. the Allen St. place. yes, ok, i know that place had rats falling out of the ceiling (literally), and the boiler broke twice, flooding the bathroom, and the kitchen cabinets were too high to be reasonably used for anything, and it got so filthy that briehan refused to sleep there… and it really wasn’t big enough for 2 people, and i was really depressed for a year while living there. but man, i can’t separate that from the brilliant times in grad school, where the apt became the subject of like every video i did, and most photos of me from that era are of me on that wonderful couch. and late at night i would pour myself out of school or whatever LES bar i was at, go to rosarios or order rush hour, and watch Sports Night or some other Tivo’d program… this place was and will always be what i think of when i think of my time in NY.
2. 411 Clermont. it’s a little far out, and i did get a bottle thrown at me in the neighborhood, as well as being hit by a car. but for any of you who never came to this place, it’s probably the closest thing to a real house you’ll ever see in NY, and it was super affordable.
3. 24-19 Steinway St. my first apt, a little 2 br railroad that i shared with PT. this place was all about video games, bad movies, and the red sox. this is where i was when i heard that the sox signed Manny Ramirez. when PT and I moved out, we packed in one huge 16 hour binge, with Blazing Saddles set on repeat in the background. and i can tell you, that movie is still funny the 8th time in a row you see it. especially if you’ve been breathing nothing but floor cleaning fluid…
4. 83 Meserole St. there were a lot of high points to this place, like space and a decent location. but there was no heat in my room, and the space heater didn’t help. my poor fingers froze for 4 months, as the wind from the unsealed windows would breeze over them on the keyboard. i can still feel the chill
5. 21-11 38th st. there were some great nights here, playing music or making great art. but there were also some really bad nights here. and if you think you’ve seen my at my worst in terms of hygiene, and most of you do, you never saw this place at the end of the run. this was a basement, and there were dead cockroaches on the floor, as well as maybe the most disgusting bathroom i’ve ever set foot in. how i lived here for 1.25 years remains a mystery to me.
6. York st. a little 3 month sublet that i had in 2002, mainly so i could be in the city to be closer to the theater i was working at. not much to say here except that i still have the bed that was left in this place, and it’s fantastic. on the downside, this place got super hot in the morning, and wasn’t really conveniently located.